Patients Fleeing Iran's Hospitals Unable To Cover Costs

There has been a spike in patients fleeing healthcare facilities in Iran due to the high cost of medical treatment, with some hospitals resorting to imprisoning patients.

In a report published by the Ham-Mihan newspaper on Thursday, a head nurse at a government hospital in Tehran disclosed that, on average, two to three patients per week flee without settling their medical bills. Such occurrences frequently involve patients from the emergency department, including injured construction workers and working class Iranians.

It is not only Iranians mixed up in the scandal, with several patients lacking medical coverage, migrants who lack insurance coverage, unable to pay the higher fees for those not covered. Rising costs of living, shortages of medication, expensive laboratory tests, and hospitalization fees are all compounding the problem.

Some families are even unable to claim dead bodies due to high hospital bills. One such case involved a young Afghan laborer who underwent heart surgery at a Tehran government hospital but did not survive. The hospital issued a $2,000 bill for his friends, who were unable to pay, leading them to abandon his body at the hospital.

In such cases, bodies typically remain in the morgue for several days, and if relatives do not claim them, they are buried anonymously, labeled as "unidentified."

In another section of the report, Mohammad Sharifi Moghadam, the Secretary-General of the Nursing House, mentioned that a large hospital in Tehran has established separate rooms for impoverished patients and keeps them in custody until their medical expenses are settled.